Signing off

This is it. Today they cut off the Internet, then the water, gas and last, power.

We will be staying with a friend for four days (Next week is a holiday here in Japan, so, of course, they can't clear us from our apartment during it... since we fly out on the last day of the holiday, it was either clear the apartment BEFORE the holiday or change our flight...). Either way, though; I'll be out of contact until I return to the land of the Stars and Stripes.

Expect reaquisition of signal on Thursday night or Friday morning. For some of you that might be earlier (I will have to post from Dad's computer until I get the computers at my house dusted off; set up and internet connected...).

I'll post a retrospective on Japan when I get back... boy do I have a lot to write about...

Until then; Moriya base here; signing off.

In the Last Days

The stress level is intense.

We have all of 11 days until we land in Houston.

But we have 7 days until we surrender this apartment...

Monday we will be getting rid of our Refridgerator... we might have to throw it away (At great cost to us) because it's more than 5 years old. The recycling fee is $60, and that's if you bring it to them (Remember, we no longer have a car... I wonder if the train would wait long enough for us to move a refridgerator onto it... )

What amazes me is this country is so into recycling... but they have massive MASSIVE penalties for appliances that are more than 5 years old (Cars, too...) so everyone buys new things every 5 years, and throws their old stuff away (Because no one wants them).

So... here is a country that is concerned about waste and trash, making more trash than Americans (And that's saying a lot...)

I'm so stressed out... But it's almost over.

Shipped

So, just how much DOES it cost to send everything you have accumulated during your time in a foreign country?

About $800.

We sent home 8 boxes via the Japanese Post... the 8 boxes weigh almost exactly (Within half a kilo) what Maia and I weigh combined.

Thus we have sent home 1 Metric us. :D

The next metric us goes home via aircraft (A 777 to be exact. I came over here on a 747 and I'm going home on a 777! I am a happy camper :D)

We have already begun the assembly of our lives in America... it's so surreal, here I sit, still in Japan, making plans for what I will do in less than a month in Texas... I'm plotting a real phone number, calling up my friends to gather up my belongings so I can move them into our new house (Which is already waiting for us). Plotting buying a car, the whole shebang...

I'm even looking to get phones and internet service rigged up so that I won't be without connectivity when I get home...

Meanwhile the rain gently falls on the streets, washing more Cherry Blossoms from the greening trees. The scooters buzz down the narrow road, the tires hissing on the wet pavement. The train goes to the station, the crossing bells chime. The City Hall clock strikes 5 O'clock with it's cute little melody which can be heard all over the town. And I type here on my computer, still in this little wonderland of strange, tiny people, remotely assembling my life in the "real world".

It's so surreal...

In transit

The thing about moving is that it involves moving...

I hate this.

I moved out of my Leopalace (The Japanese apartments that are probably best likened to "Starbucks" as there are literally 3 Leopalaces in MyTown and I have no idea how many I have seen in the spaces beteween MyTown and Maia'sTown...) and moved in with Maia...

Maia's not done yet, though... her packing has only really just begun...

So we fight... every day.

We had a tradgedy at MySchool a week before graduation, and that struck me hard... then I had to struggle to get moved out of my apartment before they took my car away, then I lost my car (It was a company car... you can't fault that :D), then I moved here... where on top of having to start all over again on the apartment thing, I'm fighting with Maia...

I just haven't let up in nearly a month...

And here I was hoping to enjoy my last spring in Japan and enjoy not having to do anything...

Well, you can't win them all...

I'll survive, but this isn't doing my stomach any good...